Gov’t spends P3B for Kennon Road rehab but more work needed to open route

LION OF KENNON This spot on Kennon Road, known as Lion’s Head, has been associated with Baguio City as tourists stop at this landmark to have their pictures taken and to relish the view of the scenic zigzag route carved out of the mountains of Benguet. —NEIL CLARK ONGCHANGCO

BAGUIO CITY, Benguet, Philippines — The government has spent more than P3 billion in repairs and rehabilitation work on Kennon Road, one of the major routes to this city and which has been closed for three years now.

But five critical sections still need to be fixed before the 33.7-kilometer stretch can be opened to all types of vehicles, officials told the city council during its regular session on Monday.

Councilors had invited the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) to explain why work along the most scenic zigzag route to the summer capital was taking so long.

Kennon Road has been described in historical accounts as the most expensive mountain route constructed and completed in 1905 for the American colonial government by local and foreign workers.

Among the builders of Kennon were Japanese and Chinese workers who settled in Baguio and Benguet province.

The councilors said the impact of the road’s closure on business has been significant both for Baguio and the neighboring Tuba town in Benguet.

Erosion prone

A drive up from Rosario, La Union province, through Kennon, takes no more than 50 minutes. Kennon connects to Tarlac-Pangasinan-La Union Expressway (TPLEx), reducing travel time from Metro Manila to Baguio to under four hours.

The DPWH had identified 21 erosion prone sections of Kennon that required immediate and comprehensive repairs, including the Demonstration Bridge at Barangay Camp 6 in Tuba.

The bridge has become dangerous for motorists, said Albert Mogol, director of the Office of Civil Defense in the Cordillera.

Mogol also heads Task Force Kennon, which was organized in 2019 to regulate the flow of traffic along the route and which ordered its closure “for the safety of motorists.”

The DPWH website says Kennon Road has 12 steel and six concrete bridges, most of which “were constructed in 1968 and have a load limit of 10 tons.”

But budgetary allocations had been staggered, forcing contractors to work on these projects by stages from 2017 to 2021, said Rene Zarate, Baguio district engineer.

To date, work on Kennon, including annual repairs following typhoons and heavy rain, has cost the government P3.2 billion, records showed.

The DPWH will need P800 million for the remaining five critical sections, said Arnold Dacwag, a member of the DPWH Cordillera planning and design unit.

Once repairs are completed, Kennon will still need to be converted into an all-weather road through a public-private partnership after the DPWH completes a feasibility study, Zarate said. —VINCENT CABREZA